I hope this is the right place to put this. I have a question about free agency. What is an restricted free agent? I want Ohalete to be around next year but my father in law told me he is indeed a "restricted free agent", like all hope was gone of him being a Skin next year. What makes one unrestricted as opposed to restricted. Is it in their contract which they will be?? Thanks for the answers.

Whenever I start to get blue, I just breathe!

My favortie line from the Simpsons:

Flanders: "Looks like someone is having a pre-rapture party!"

Homer: "No Flanders, it's a meeting of gay witches for abortion , you wouldn't be interested!"

Restricted free agents (RFA) and unrestricted free agents (UFA) really have nothing to do with picks given up for the player, although the picks are the compenasation if restricted OR unrestricted free agents change teams.

First of all, obviously a free agent is someone who's present contract has run out and he is now FREE to go look at new contract offers.

They dress it up pretty fancy with big words and definitions and stuff, but the difference between an RFA and an UFA is really pretty simple...

An UFA has been with his present team for FOUR years and his contract has now run out.

An RFA has only been with his team for THREE years and his contract has run out.

Any player who has been with a team less than THREE years and has their contract expire, is a different kind of free agent -- an exclusive rights free agent (EFA)

So if that was all you knew... you'd at least know HOW the players got to be the type of free agents that they are.

But this is Football 101, so I'll take it another step further and explain a little more about each:

Unestricted Free AgentsHave the right to sign with any other team that they want and the former team gets nothing in compensation... no draft picks.

Restricted Free AgentA restricted free agent can sign with another team, but his original team has what they call the right of first refusal. They have the right to match the contract offered to the player within one week of the RFA signing a contract offer with another team.

IF the original team decides to MATCH the offer then the player goes back to his original club.

IF the original club DOES NOT MATCH the offer then the team that RECEIVES the player must give up a draft pick. The draft pick will be equivalent to the original draft pick of the free agent that changed teams.

So...
Darnerian McCants is an RFA. McCants was a 5th round draft pick. If McCants was offered a contract with someone else and the Redskins refused to match it... the Redskins would get a 5th round draft pick as compensation from the team that he went to.

Note: I use this as an example only to clear up another thread on the same issue (McCants). In that thread someone said what if Darnerian was offered ANOTHER contract after the Redskins matched it the first time... that can't happen... if the Redskins match the contract offer... that becomes the contract. There would be no further opportunity for another team to even offer another contract.

I hope this helps clear some things up.

Last edited by BossHog on Sun Jan 25, 2004 12:14 am, edited 2 times in total.

noshirtforyou wrote:Nope you can still be a 1st round pick and restricted, im not sure how the process goes for picking who's a UFA and whos a RFA

It is possible, but it's not as possible anymore... teams would rarely sign their first round draft pick to only a 3 year contract... I say rarely... but after the Redskins signed RFAs left right and center last off-season... it will become even rarer still. 1st round players will rarely get to sign such short contracts.

Front Offices changed the way they did things. The Browns FO made sure that ALL of their draft picks signed 4 or 5 year contracts last year so that none of the players would be RFAs in 3 years that could be plucked for a nothing draft pick.

Boss - I had heard that there were a lot of teams doing that, and that more of them were probably going to offer higher tenders than usual to prohibit raiding like we did last year. For example, Cerrato (don't hit me) said that if Coles had been both a first and third pick due to the Jets tender, they wouldn't have gone after him.

There are contracts out there that are still going to be RFAs for the next few years simply due to the fact that the Skins caught everyone off balance last year. A lot of the contracts were signed as 3 year contracts even as late as last year, so for the next couple of years beyond this one there will be RFAs available.

There is a provision that depending on how much the team offers an RFA when they tender their offer that the compensation is higher, right Boss?

Rich in Roanoke
_______________________________________
Let others hail the rising sun:
I bow to that whose course is run

But I was trying to keep this basic, because a lot of things can get quite complicated with what-ifs etc.

I thought if people understood the basic principles of restricted vs. unrestricted, it'd be a good place to start.

For those wanting that much more...

As Rich said... compensation DOES go up based on the amount of the contract tendered to the player. IF a team were to offer the RFA a contract over the amount of $600,000 or 110% of the previous year's contract (whichever is greater), then they would be subject to giving up a first round draft pick.

But you rarely see this happen. let's keep in mind that this is based on what the OFFERING team bids. Teams will only tender an offer of that amount if they are willing to give up their first round pick. So they rarely offer such an amount because they themselves don't want to give up a first round pick.

Except for in an example like Coles. In 3 years, LC firmly established that he was worthy of a first round draft pick compensation, and so the Redskins went after him with an amount that obviously was more than $600K or 110%.

Interesting note here though... Coles base salaries for the first two years were very low. That is why his signing bonus was so high... to make up for it. The provision for what you offer the player refers only to his salary, not his signing bonus.

The Redskins did this deliberately to avoid stepping up to the next level of compensation for an RFA which is $800k or 110% whichever is more. If the Redskins had given him an average SB and higher per year amounts, then they likely would have had to have given up a first round pick AND a third round pick for Coles. That's why most of the contracts had higher signing bonuses and lower per annums in all incidents were they stole RFAs.

Smooooth move by the FO... as we wrote about continuously at the time... the way that the FO attacked FA was not only brilliant... it changed the way teams structure rookie contracts.

SirSmizzy wrote:If Terry Bradway removed his head from his anus during the contract talks things might be diffeent......but thats not here nor there.

I wish our FO would shoe a little brass and spend some cash...we will see this off season.

The penny pinchin jets spend some cash...

If Bradway pulled his head out of his ass, the only thing he'd see is that his owner's CHEAPNESS is what made him stuff his own head up his ass in the first place. Woody's wallet doesn't even open... and every time he does take something out of his wallet, a little moth flies out.

Henderson or Gregg Williams for DC in NY? Well let's see the Jets would have had to pay Williams, so I guess it'll be Henderson.

The Skins have already plucked one Jets' choice so far this offseason, question is...